"
"I know what is my own."
Ingolby lit his pipe, his eyes reflectively scanning the other.
"Have you got it again out here--your own?"
"Not yet, but I will."
Ingolby took out his watch, and looked at it. "I haven't found it easy
getting all that belongs to me."
"You have found it easier getting what belongs to some one else," was the
snarling response.
Ingolby's jaw hardened. What did the fellow mean? Did he refer to money,
or--was it Fleda Druse? "See here," he said, "there's no need to say
things like that. I never took anything that didn't belong to me, that I
didn't win, or earn or pay for--market price or 'founder's shares'"--he
smiled grimly. "You've given me the best treat I've had in many a day.
I'd walk fifty miles to hear you play my Sarasate--or even old Berry's
cotton-field fiddle. I'm as grateful as I can be, and I'd like to pay you
for it; but as you're not a professional, and it's one gentleman to
another as it were, I can only thank you--or maybe help you to get what's
your own, if you're really trying to get it out here. Meanwhile, have a
cigar and a drink."
He was still between the Romany and the wall, and by a movement forward
sought to turn Jethro to the spirit-table. Probably this manoeuvring was
all nonsense, that he was wholly misreading the man; but he had always
trusted his instincts, and he would not let his reason rule him entirely
in such a situation.
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